This time last year....11/11/2010

For this child I prayed, and the LORD has granted me my petition which I asked of Him. 
~1 samuel 1:27 from NKJV


Its so very hard for me to believe that Bella is a year old.   I have a swarm of emotions going on today...excitement that she is a year old, sadness that its gone by way too fast (slow down, mama wants to hold you a little longer), thankfulness that we (she) hasn't had any major health or physical problems to date, blessed to have such a wonderful, beautiful baby girl, scared for her future in this hard world, but most of all I feel more love for her then the day she was born.  Words could never be enough to describe the feelings you have for your child. 


So HAPPY BIRTHDAY my sweet Bella, we love you more than words!! 

My life as (HIS) Air Force Wife

The military lifestyle, for me at least, is...different.  Some people mesh very well with it.  They live on base and love it, always attend the family support meetings.  They love moving, getting new orders, and seem to make instant friends wherever they go.  This is not me.  

And I don't mean to sound like I am bashing this breed of military wife.  I envy it, actually.  It takes me a while to find my groove in a new place.  I would never live on base, unless forced.  I don't like the military to envelope my life.  I love that my husband feels joy in what he does.  But what he does and what I do are two different things.  I need the separation from the base.  Minus the time spent overseas, we rarely shop on base, and when Todd gets off of work, the uniform gets taken off and I feel like I can return to my "normal" life.

And I HATE moving.   I hate trying to make another house a home, all to realize that I have to do it all again in 2-3 years.  I hate leaving old and amazing friends, and it is hard for me to put myself out there to make new ones.  I hate that one of the first questions I am asked is "what rank is your husband?"  I hate deployments and TDYs.  I hear all the time "thank God he's leaving for a week" but I loathe time away from my hubby.  I hate when he gets called in or stays late for nonsense that only the military can make up.  I want my daughter to grow up almost the same way I grew up...in 1 house for 18 years, friends that I knew in 1st grade and graduated with, a place that always feels like home no matter how long I've been away from it.

A lot of rambling/venting just to say while some spouses thrive in this kind of lifestyle, I have yet to find my groove in it.  Luckily I seem to have met at least one person here that makes me feel normal and myself, and doesn't define me by my husband, what he does, or what his rank is.  I am trying my best to be open, and will of course continue to support and love my husband to my greatest ability, but I hope that someday I grow more fond of what this lifestyle has to offer.  And if anyone has any friendly advice, it is always welcome.

Binky Bootcamp...aka taking the pacifier away from BR

We did it, its our fault, and we take full (okay part) responsibility why she has this addiction.  As I was laying in bed the other night (husband and both dogs snoring up a storm...aargh), I was thinking that maybe we probably need to not let her sleep with the paci anymore (envisions daughter graduating high school with pacifier in mouth).  Now to be fair we don't give it to her all the time or even to shut her up (like some parents I have seen...ahem).  We just give it to her at night and during her naps.  Before Bella was born I always said I wouldn't be that parent that has a 4 year old thats still sucking away on their paci (I apologize now if whoever is reading this has one of those).  So, when she was born Todd and I agreed NO PACIFIER's!!  We went with it for awhile, I believe it was at her 1 month checkup that the doctor asked if she sucked on a paci and of course we said no.  Well, she then told us that it helps some babies sooth...blah, blah, blah, blah, and oh blah.  So, we decided to see how she reacted to it and well, she loved it, thinking back on it now, it was a bad move on our part.  We should of stayed strong!  Fast forward 8 months to August 2011, we now have agreed to get rid of it all together.  So, I decided to start with nights (since thats when she's most tired). Todd came in as I was giving her a night time bottle and I said I'm not giving her the pacifier tonight, he said...at all, and I said yep, good luck he responds.  I thought cold turkey should work, she's exhausted, it will be fine.  As soon as I laid her down, she knew exactly what was missing....her drug!  I came downstairs and said we'll wait for 10 minutes and if she doesn't stop crying by then, then I'll go back up and give it to her.  She didn't, in fact when I went in to give her back her drug (I guess I'm considered her drug dealer, ha) she was sweating and crying (like withdraw symptoms).  I felt bad but decided that every night we'll just make it longer and longer till we go give it to her.  I hope tonight is a bit easier on us both...stay tuned!!

The Great Work Debate

To work or not to work that is the question.  Financially we are blessed right now that we do not need dual income to make ends meet, we just have to stick to a budget (my husband will appreciate that line).  I've been debating going back to work since the second I knew I was pregnant, way back when we were still living in Hungary.  I have to admit I absolutely love working but I also absolutely love our daughter.  As a normal person I have a pretty overactive imagination but as a mother its 10X worse.  For example, I had a job interview the other day and Todd was out of town for AF stuff so of course we needed a babysitter.  We've interviewed this lady and both felt pretty comfortable that she would take pretty good care of Bella.  So, this was the 1st time since moving here that we left her with anyone.  I'm sure you can imagine what was all going through my head as I pulled out of our drive way....kid nap, neglect, torture, starvation, and abuse.  So me with my crazy imagination drove around the neighborhood 3 times to make sure her car was still there....and it was.  When I think of leaving Bella at a daycare all day or with a stranger I get major anxiety which usually ends in me crying and Todd looking at me like I just escaped from the looney bin.  Not only that I think of all the things I could possibly miss (all of her 1st's), and that just crushes me.  I love spending my days with her but then I also think that it would do me good to work.  I've thought about working part time but then basically my pay check would be going toward child care, which to me is kind of pointless.  Todd is in no way pressuring me to work, just being ultra supportive and wants me to do what I feel comfortable doing (I'm a lucky girl).  So, I continue debating this issue and weigh the pro's and cons constantly...until I come to a resolution, I'm going to go love on my baby girl!

Busy Month of July

We've had an extremely busy July...traveling, a wonderful wedding, more traveling, even more traveling, moving, again more traveling, and finally we arrive in Missouri...what the!  Its not a surprise that all of us are exhausted and seem to be getting sick.  Lets start at the beginning...we drove to Pittsburgh/Dubois to see our 2 wonderful friends get married, spent some time with our other wonderful friends, and then flew to Phoenix to see my husband's family for a few days (extra bonus seeing our friends again, yay), then flew to Kansas City, to see our new home, then drove back to Dayton, OH...to watch our things get packed up just so we could drive back to Missouri...yowsa!  But, now that we feel a little settled (still haven't gotten our stuff yet...that will happen this Friday, thankfully) all of the travel and stress is finally catching up to all of us.  Little Bean (aka, BR, aka Bella Rose) has a major cough right now, so we're making a trip to her new Doctor tomorrow...don't get me started on the whole tri-care prime transfer to tri-care prime remote...ugh!!!!  So, hopefully she'll feel better soon...Todd C. has some strange cough/headache thing going on....I only have been sneezing...I think due to allergies here.  But, if this is all we get from all of our traveling, I'm totally fine with that.  So, right now I can breathe a little easier until Friday, when the stress of moving returns to us watching the movers all day with an active 8 month old who recently has discovered climbing upstairs, but boy is she cute when she goes up them!

7 Months....already

Its hard for me to believe that she's already 7 months old...it still feels like yesterday when I held her for the very 1st time and thought...wow I'm in charge of another human being's life.  God really knew what he was was doing when he gave her to us...she's patient yet has an attitude, she sleeps through the night but wakes up at 0730 every morning regardless of the time she goes to bed, she only cries when she's extremely tired or extremely hungry, she smiles all the time even if she has a fever and she can't breathe through her nose, she always knows where to touch you when your having a not so good day...we are 100% blessed!  Todd and I often wonder what we did to deserve her.  I truly wish time wouldn't go by so quickly, because I know before we know it she'll be graduating high school.  But, for now I'm going to hold her as much as I can cause I know one day she won't want me to!  We love you Bella, you've blessed us in more ways than you'll ever know!

for a split second I thought we had a newborn again....

So our little bundle of joy is ill...sadly.  You would never know by day that she is congested but by night you definitely can tell.  We've called our pediatrician 3 times about it and all we can really do is giver her saline drops and a decongestant.  She's so miserable...which means we're both very miserable.  But, I have to hand it to her, she's a trooper.  She doesn't have a fever, she is still eating, and still acts normal during the day.  Last night was really rough, we put her to bed at her normal time like we do every night and she slept till about 10:30ish and then she was coughing, sneezing, oh the sounds coming from her poor little nose...made us both so helpless and sad.  So, out goes my husband to any open pharmacy to find something to help her.  I however stayed at home, rocked her back to sleep and then the googling started and the pediatrician calling...etc.  I have to say sometimes I love our pediatrician and well sometimes I hate our pediatrician.  But, I know they would do the same that we've been doing if we did bring her in...it just sucks, I hate seeing her so miserable and not being to sleep good (cause she's a great sleeper).  So, daddy comes back, we give her a little more decongestant and we put her back to sleep....3 hours later, same thing, for a split second I thought we had a newborn again.  At 4 in the morning we were commenting on how we didn't miss this part about having a baby.  So, for now our little bundle of joy is in her swing sleeping somewhat soundly (as much as you can when you nose is stuffed up) and I just hope and pray she gets over this really soon...heck I'll take her sickness for 2 months if it means she can sleep again...through the night.

She's a trooper though, we took her out to a bark for life event, thinking its nice out and maybe the fresh air would help and she smiled and slept the whole time!!

almost 5 months.....wow

Its so hard for us to believe that Bella is almost 5 months.  I never thought 4 months ago that we would be sleeping through night....ever again!  I have to say the last 5 months have been wonderful.  She makes me a better person through and through, and I cannot believe that she is mine!  We are truly blessed with such a happy beautiful baby girl!  We love you so much my dear!

4 months....time goes by so fast!

Its hard for me to believe that Bella is already 4 months old.  It seems just like yesterday that we were bringing her home, scared out of our minds, thinking...okay now we're in charge of another human being...what do we do now?  Its been a wonderful 4 months, she is worth all the sleepless nights, all the spit up rags we wash, all the nights that I miss one of my shows I use to watch, and definitely all the weekends that we use to go out.  We love her more than words can express and cannot believe that this time last year we were pregnant and didn't even know it.

We are very truly blessed....our sweet girl Bella we love you SO much!!

determined to stay positive

A lot has happened since my last post.  First I was told on my birthday via voice mail that my mom was undergoing breast cancer surgery.  I must admit I didn't believe it since the night before I talked to her on the phone and she was in good spirits and it didn't seem like anything was wrong.  I have to say that I was and still am a little upset that they knew about all this way before Christmas and that they waited till the day of to tell any of us.  Secondly, being told that Bella's head has grown too quickly and that there might be some sort of problem.  So off to Children's Hospital we go to get an ultra sound done on her head, thankfully nothing was wrong, she just has a big head, which is perfectly fine with me.

Now onto my mom...its been a very difficult road for her after the surgery.  While she was recovering from her breast surgery, she got a really bad infection in her knee.  So, back into the OR she went where they drained her knee and started her on some heavy antibiotics.  Once she finally got checked out of the hospital, she was told that they did not get all the cancer in her arm and that she had a cancer spot on her spine.  Now, she is taking medication to stop the spread of this cancer while not being able to walk cause of her knee.  And yesterday she was told that once this infection clears up in her knee that she will have to have a total knee replacement.  It just seems like the hits just keep coming...I know she isn't the only person that has ever gone through this and I know that we're not the only family dealing with all of this but it doesn't make it any easier on any of us.  I just got back from visiting with her on Wednesday, it had to be one of the hardest visits I've ever had with them.  I'm not use to seeing my mom in a wheel chair and barely being able to move around.  I think what made me the most sad was seeing her with Bella.  She just wanted to love on her and hold her and it was hard for her to do that, cause these days Bella is very active. It was very hard for me to leave them on Tuesday to drive back up to Ohio.  I know we still have a very long road ahead of us....but I am determined to stay positive.

advice...hug your mom today...I love you mom!!  

A year to remember and be thankful for...

Happy New Year!!

A LOT has happened this past year...2 of our wonderful friends got married in Puerto Rico, we found out while still living in Hungary that we were pregnant, 2 other of our wonderful friends got engaged, we moved from Hungary to Dayton, Ohio, my sister and her family moved to Hawaii shortly after we got back to the states, we found out we were having a girl, 2 other of our wonderful friends found out that they were having a baby, my brother got deployed for the 3rd time and last but not least we had our beautiful baby girl.

We are truly thankful for everything good or bad that has happened in 2010.  And as the New Year is winding up we are looking forward to so many new things....friends getting married, friends having babies, my husband's master degree graduation, moving yet again to a new location, my brother coming home at the end of the year, and the growth of our daughter.

I hope you all have a very blessed and wonderful New Year!!